Yuri Network News – (百合ネットワークニュース) – December 8, 2022

December 10th, 2022

Yuri Anime

Crunchyroll has picked up Liz and the Blue Bird, say ANN’s Alex Mateo. I really hope you’ll watch this, if you haven’t already. It was quite good and worth watching a second time, as I mentioned in my 2019 review.

I believe I’ve mentioned this, but YNN correspondent Cryssoberyl brought it up again on the Okazu Discord and I want to make sure you are realize that Citrus is celebrating a 10th anniversary, with an memorial exhibition in the Shinjuku Marui and an 10th anniversary broadcast of the anime. Check the Citrus 10th Anniversary Website for details.

 

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Yuri Manga

We’ll start with some new items up on the Yuricon Store. ^_^ It’s still been kind of busy, but I really hope to catch up on adding items starting this week.

Yuri is My Job, Volume 10 is out and features Nene having had it with “friggin’ heteros” and I am here for it. ^_^

Yuri Espoir, Volume 3 complicates the issue of Kokoro’s “death” by marriage.

For fans of messy relationships, Uso to Kiss ha Houkago, Volume 2 (嘘とキスは放課後) is now up on the Store.

It’s been delayed a few times, but Dark Horse has finally released Legend of Korra: Patterns in Time. I’m really looking forward to reading this.

Jennifer O’Donnell and I talked about the darling Yuri series Whisper Me A Love Song from Kodansha, by Takeshima Eku on her Translation Chat podcast!

 

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Yuri VNs/Games/Voice Drama

Kiss The Demiurge is now available on Steam! A mage tasked with hiding magic meets three girls obsessed with finding it.

Samurai Maiden is also out on Steam, in which kisses lead to power ups. ^_^ Again via Cryssoberyl, here are all the “devoted hearts” animations, in a YT compilation by Kakuchopurei.

It’s not Yuri, but anyway, River City Girls 2, has a release date for North America and Europe, reports Liam Doolan at Nintendo Life.

The Good, The Bad and the Horsey is a “fantasy Wild West GL/WLW/yuri VN” available on itch.io from Team Bumblebee. Someone  offer to review this for us, please. It looks fun as heck. ^_^ Features of the game include Horses and “More horses,” what’s not to like?

 

Yuri Novels & Light Novels

Lots on news from Twitter over the last couple of weeks.

Manga Mogura had the news that the Adachi and Shimamura series will end with the 12th novel.

Yurimother announced that Seven Seas has licensed Qualia the Purple light novel.

douqi says that Chinese baihe novel An Endless Story (有终) are up for pre-orders on Weibo.

Via kokumura, we learn that Kimi no Kyoshitsu ga Eien no Nemurinitsuku ni Made (君の教室が永遠の眠りにつくまで) Yuri horror, mystery novel, has won the The 42nd Masafumi Yokomizo Mystery & Horror Grand Prize of Excellence award. Our little genre is growing up. ^_^

 

By Your Side News

My publisher has a roundup of some of the stuff I’ve been doing this year for my book By Your Side: The First 100 Years of Yuri Anime and Manga! While I’m at it, let’s do one more thing: Buy a copy of BYS as a gift for someone and I’ll make sure that you and they get a signed bookplate or digital bookplate! Just email me at bys@yuricon.com with a scan/screencap of your receipt and the addresses or emails you’d like me to send to, names and whether I’m sending a real or digital bookplate.

Because I can’t write much anymore, I apologize that I can’t write custom messages. But for hand-signed I’ll my best to get names in there. ^_^;

 

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Posted in Yuri Network News | No Comments »


Otona ni Nattemo, Volume 7 (おとなになっても)

December 8th, 2022

In Shimura Takako’s Otona ni Nattemo, Volume 7 (おとなになっても) a lot happens.

We left Akari and Ayano having been carefully not seeing one another for some time, as Ayano’s divorce proceeds. When they meet again, they mutually decide to begin over, but the rumor that Ayano is having an affair begins to spread.  In school, Ichika’s life has become more complicated as she’s refusing to return to class. I’m honestly way more invested in the well-being of the children than I want to be. ^_^;
Eri and Wataru are reeling as their relationships fail. Neither the adults nor the children are particularly alright.

But Akari and Ayano are doing a pilgrimage to Akari’s hometown, visiting her childhood haunts. They are taking time to talk through their lives – something they have never had a chance to do. It’s good for them. There is a particularly charming moment, when they fantasize about having gone to school together…who would they have been and how would they have related to one another? The art is especially cute as they (as adults) imagine each other as children.

When they return, they find that the rumors are picking up steam. But they have made a decision. They tell Akari’s family that she is moving out…and moving in with Ayano.

Shimura-sensei’s art is not refined in these chapters, but there’s a sense of motion, and emotion, that is subtle and intense.  When she’s good, she’s really good. This story is one of the adultest mange I have ever read. I cannot imagine being a teenager and giving a hoot about anyone in this manga for any reason. ^_^

Ratings:

Art – 8
Story – 8
Characters – 8 I don’t think I dislike anyone…. there’s no bad guys here
Service – 0
LGBTQ+ – 6, maybe? Lives are changing while we watch

Overall – 8

Little girls and and friendship and school, adults and marriage and divorce and choices with consequences. This series would make a pretty solid live-action drama.
 

Posted in LGBTQ, Shimura Takako, Yuri Manga | No Comments »


line, by Yua Kotegawa

December 7th, 2022

One of our best supporters and dearest friends here at Okazu, Bruce, died about 5 years ago. I have been slowly working my way through all his anime and manga. Much of it has been given to a good home, some of it has been part of Lucky Boxes. Recently, I can to the last box of English-language manga in his collection…and I found something I had never heard of!

line, by Yua Kotegawa is an English-language edition put out in 2006 by ADV Manga, so this is way past just “out of print.” It’s not really Yuri in any sense, either. But after reading it, I can totally understand why Bruce had it in his collection. If he were alive, I would ask him to review it. So he’ll have to guest review from the spirit world today.

Chiko is a popular, cute girl at school. She doesn’t concern herself with the kind of class bullying that exists around her, she’s just in her own world, doing her own thing.

The book opens up as she finds someone’s dropped cell phone. She’s going to bring it to lost and found when it rings…and the person on the other end commands her to rush to a location to save the life of a student about to commit suicide. The voice explains how horrible life is when one is ostracized or bullied. Chiko arrives too late, but is seen yelling into the phone by a classmate, Bando. Bando is a quiet otaku type, but quickly becomes Chiko’s partner as they seek to find and save people about to kill themselves. The phone rings and they go running. They don’t always make it, but sometimes they do. And those people become part of the team. The suicides ramp up in frequency, until the anonymous caller has Chiko, Bando and everyone they saved, running around town saving as many people as possible. Eventually the caller kills himself and the team all lay, exhausted on a roof.

The next day, Chiko invites one of the bullied kids in her class out with her and Bando and the rest out to do something that’s no biggie…because, as she says, everyone going has got very sore muscles.

So, yeah, this is hardly a worldshaking book, but it hits pretty solidly in showing how important it is for people to not just passively accept bullying and loss. Chiko and Bando aren’t a couple, there’s never any tension between them of that kind, but the circumstance draws them together and, by extension, draws people to them. I can see all sorts of parallels to that in my life. Communities of interest are the invites out, the group of people with something in common to talk about.

ADV missed a chance to post a suicide hotline phone number, but I won’t. If you think you can’t do this any more, please call someone. In the USA, just remember 988. Please call. Someone is there to listen.

No ratings today.

Posted in Bruce P, English Manga | 4 Comments »


Catch These Hands, Volume 3

December 5th, 2022

It was in March 2020 when I reviewed Watashi no Kobushi wo Uketomete, Volume 3 ( 私の拳をうけとめて). Re-reading that review, honestly, I can add little to it for this review, so I will quote myself liberally. ^_^ My apologies in advance. 

In Volume 2, Takebe has hit the end of her rope in trying to be a new person. She’s not feeling the support from Soramori she thought she’d get. For her part, Kirara is half jealous and half frustrated by Takebe’s search to become someone else. They stop speaking, both confused as how to move forward.

As I said in my review of the Japanese Volume 3: The problem is not that they aren’t enjoying each other’s company…Takebe starts to really understand what Soramori means to her when they aren’t hanging out. And it’s not that they are rivals, Soramori, realizes as days go by when they aren’t speaking. But something is off and they both know it. In Catch These Hands, Volume 3, Takebe reaches back into her past to try and create a new future…in the wrongest way possible, by assuming that she can’t move forward until she’s settled the past with KiraraAfter taking to Maria (and training for the confrontation that’s coming,) Takebe calls Soramori to the park to have it out the old-fashioned way. The way they know, the way they met each other. She challenges her former gang-member rival girlfriend to a fight. And fight they do.

And, at last, Soramori understands. THIS is the woman she fell in love with. This is the self she wants to be. And when she beats Takebe into the ground with one final punch, she finds that the two of them really enjoyed beating the heck out of each other.  

As the volume comes to a close, they have – as far as they are able – to communicate that they want to continue dating. And now, maybe they can stop worrying about being something they are not.

Ratings:

Art – 7
Story – 7
Characters – 8
Service – 0
Yuri – 5

The team at Yen Press did a great job. Amanda Hadley’s translation of the gang patois works for Takebe. This story is a lot of fun, again. ^_^

Volume 4 is headed our way next spring!

Posted in Events, Yuri Manga | 4 Comments »


 Comic Yuri Hime December 2022 (コミック百合姫2022年12月号)

December 4th, 2022

And so we come to the end of another year. Comic Yuri Hime, December 2022 is, like so many of the Decembers before it, not a finale at all, but a transition to the the new year. Our cover trip around Japan comes to an end, however. We’ll be getting a completely different look and feel for 2023.

For me, this volume was all about the climax of the Scales of Love arc in “Watashi no Oshi ha Akuyaku Reijou Desu.” It was exactly as epic as I could have hoped. Now the story is going to become a bit more serious, then deadly serious. I can’t wait!

In “Odoriba Skirt ni Naru,” Michiru and Kiki are trying to find the balance they need to be a good dancing pair. Neither really understands what being “like lovers” means, and they both end up unpacking a bit of Michiru’s feelings about being called “kawaii,” until Kiki realizes that she just thinks Michiru is really kawaii and Michiru learns to accept it. They find the place they can be together and head back from dance camp ready to be a pair.

“Lonely Girl ni Sakarenai” comes to end on the right note. Ayaka is finally able to pass the exam, and she and Sora embaak upon a life together. A particularly fantastic note is when they talk to their friends and decide, that even though they may not be together every day, they can still at least stay in touch. We all know that our friendships change with circumstances, but at least they don’t opt for “we’ll never see each other again!” refrain.

Shiho is given an entire chapter to reconcile herself to the (obvious to us) idea that she likes Aki, in “Sasayakoyouni Koi wo Utau,” and now I can safely say, I am done with Shiho. Her love of drama has worn out my interest in her. I’m hoping this month’s issue is back to the battle of the bands.

“Kimi to Shiranai Natsu ni Naru” took a surprisingly realistic turn and I’m a bit on eggshells as to what might happen. Has Hi-chan given up in deciding to go back to school?

A number of series are winding down, “Natsu to Lemon to Overlay” has hit an impasse. If Yunimaru-san won’t ask what is going on, well, then, we’ll never know. In “Futari Escape,” we go to a fossil museum, which was fun.

In “Onna Tomodachi to Kekkonshitemita” Rio has now decided that Kurumi and Ruriko are a more fun family than her parents.

“Kimi to Tsuzuru Utakata” is running out of somewhere to go, as well, but finally has pushed Shizuku out of her self-imposed paralysis, even if it took a shock to do it.

As always there a lot of other stories, some of which I read and others I did not. This was a sold year. I’ll be sad to see some some series go and curious to see if some of the new ones fill their space.

Ratings:

Overall – 8

January 2023 is already out and the new year already has a different tone. We’ll have to see whether it will hit the right notes for me.  ^_^

Posted in Comic Yuri Hime, Magazines, Yuri Manga | No Comments »